Syllabus
Philosophy 102
Instructor: Ken
Himma
Office: Savery
M347E
Telephone: 206.543.5855
e-mail: himma@u.washington.edu
Office
Hours: Monday
Text: Morality and Moral Controversies, 6th ed., John Arthur (ed.), (
Web Page: http://faculty.washington.edu/himma
Course Description: In this course, we will consider a number of
controversial issues in applied ethics, including the following: 1) Do animals have
rights? 2) Should abortion be legally permitted? 3) Do we have any obligation
to protect the environment? 4) Should we allow euthanasia? 5) Is charity
obligatory? 6) Is war ever justified? 7)
Is terrorism ever justified? We will
consider different answers to these questions and evaluate arguments that have
been offered in support of those answers.
The aims of the
course are threefold: 1) to acquaint students with the rich philosophical
literature discussing these problems; 2) to improve the ability of students to
identify and critically evaluate philosophical arguments; and 3) to improve the
analytic and expository writing of students.
Accordingly, students will be expected to participate actively in class
discussions by presenting and defending their views on issues discussed in the
reading.
Course Requirements: There will be two midterm exams (100 points) and one
final exam (100 points). The
examinations will consist of 4 to 5 essay questions. Approximately a week prior to each exam, I
will hand out a list of 10 to 12 study questions. All of the questions on the exam will be
taken from these study questions. You
are advised to prepare written answers to each study question and then study
your answers in preparation for the exam.
Additionally,
I will occasionally assign short answer questions; the answers to these
questions will usually (though not always) be collected on the following
day. When I do collect your answers to a
particular study question, it will be worth five points. During the course of the quarter, I may (or
may not) collect as many as ten answers.
These answers must be turned in on time and in class or discussion
section.
Students
desiring W-credit may substitute one 8- to 11-page paper assignment on a topic
of their choice for the second midterm exam.
Students may write on either a topic that is discussed in class or on a
topic in the book not covered in class; however, the paper must provide a
philosophical analysis of some problem in applied ethics. Students who elect to write a paper should
notify their teaching assistants in advance of the second exam.
Some
advice on writing: You should strive
to write for a reasonably intelligent audience unfamiliar with the
material. In other words, someone who
has never taken this course should be able to understand your paper. One good way to ensure this is to let a
friend (who is not taking the course) read your term paper. If she can make sense of it and can explain
what’s going on, you are on the right track.
If not, you should strongly consider rewriting your paper or exam until
your friend can make sense of it. It
will help you to write more clearly if you think of yourself as attempting to
teach the material to the reader.
The
rationale for this requirement is as follows: most of the writing you do in
your professional life will be for people who ask you to answer a question
because they do not know the answer.
They will not be satisfied with your work if they have to guess at what
you mean because your sentences are unclear or ungrammatical. It will be your responsibility to present
your answer in a clear, concise way that anticipates and responds to questions
and objections that might arise in the reader’s mind. This ability is essential to good analytical
and expository writing.
Accordingly, your
writing assignments, including exams, will be graded with the following
considerations in mind: 1) organizational structure; 2) substantive content
(including quality of explanations and analysis); and 3) quality of writing.
Class Attendance: While class attendance in a class of this
size obviously cannot be monitored, regular class attendance is to your
advantage for two reasons. First, the
exam questions will generally test you on material that is covered in class but
not in the readings. Second, students
will be assigned homework questions in class that cannot be made up.
Week 1 (1/6-1/10): Who Matters Morally? Moral Anthropocentrism and Moral
Animocentrism
Baxter, “People or
Penguins”
Recer, “Chimps a lot like us, just missing the brain power”
at http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/134435389_chimp12.html
Singer, “All Animals are Equal”
Week 2 (1/13-1/17): Who Matters Morally? Animocentrism
and Biocentrism
Steinbock,
“Speciesism and the Idea of Equality”
Taylor, “The Ethic of Respect for Nature” (E-reserves)
Goodpaster, “On Being Morally Considerable” (E-reserves)
“Scientific Study Concludes: Rape is the
Product of Evolution,” at http://www.ishipress.com/rapeevol.htm
Week 3 (1/20-1/24): Land Ethic; and Abortion
Callicott, “The Land Ethic”
Thomson, “A Defense of
Abortion”
Week 4
(1/27-1/31): Abortion (cont.) and
Euthanasia
Marquis, “An Argument that
Abortion is Wrong”
Roe v. Wade
Cruzan v. Director,
First
Midterm Exam: Friday, January 31
Week 5
(2/3-2/7): Euthanasia (cont)
Dyck, “An Alternative to the Ethic of Euthanasia”
Rachels, “Active and Passive Euthanasia”
Brandt, “Defective Newborns
and the Morality of Termination
Week 6
(2/10-2/14): The Death Penalty
Gregg v.
Glover, “Executions”
Perlmutter, “Desert and Capital Punishment”
Week 7
(2/17-2/21): Economic Justice:
Personal Responsibility
Hardin,
“Lifeboat Ethics” (reserve)
Singer,
“Rich and Poor”
Second
Midterm Exam: Friday, February 21
Week 8
(2/24-2/28): Economic Justice: Social
Responsibility
Locke, “Second Treatise of
Government”
Nozick, “The Entitlement Theory”
Rawls, “A Theory of Justice”
Papers Due
Tuesday, February 25
Week 9 (3/3-3/7): Violence, Terrorism, and War
The Economist, “Do Guns Mean Crime?”
Wasserstrom,
“On the Morality of War”
Frey and Morris, “Terrorism”
Week 10 (3/10-3/14): Topics to be Announced